I don’t see google paid hosting as a good move for google.
Web hosting is a (still) highly fragmented marketplace.
Web hosting is fragmented market because it is a commodity product and there are low barriers to entry. I don’t see google overcoming either of these issues. They built their search brand based on having a superior product. I am not sure that google can offer a truly superior product in the hosting space.
with the millions in extra cash that they have lying around, Google can easily acquire even the most premier hosting company and use it as a base to build a business around. Alternatively, Google could simply buy up tons of customers from smaller hosts.
The dot bomb strategy didn’t work in 1999, why would it work now?
The barriers to entry are extremely low
Small companies enter markets where the barriers to entry are low. Large companies try to create barriers to entry.
Arguably, the single most important element in gaining new customers is online advertising
I am sure that time warner makes a bunch of money on advertising for snake oil. that doesn’t mean that they should sell the snake oil.
Web hosting requires tons of servers, data centers, and skilled technical support staff.
I think these are hygienic factors, not necessarily competitive advantages. Apple has lawyers and GM has lawyers, therefore Apple should make cars? Google’s technological innovations have been in using very cheap redundant hardware. I am not sure that this transfers to commodity paid hosting.
Email and Web hosting go hand in hand.
Google is quite new to large scale email. Also, if you paid for the email, why would you accept the advertising? I don’t see the synergy.
Many businesses and consumers will only do business with a brand that they trust.
There are lots of trustworthy brands already in the hosting market.
A google browser makes sense — one more way to show google ads and block competitors ads. I don’t see hosting as a good fit for google. That doesn’t mean they won’t do it. I just don’t think they would do it until they lacked better things to do, things that don’t drift as far from their core business: selling advertising.
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Another interesting angle (probably not planned by Google) is GmailFS. Considering “live CD” versions of Linux like Knoppix and dyne:bolic (the latter is particurily impressive, IMO, as an example of a specialized distro) there’s an opportunity here to have your own customized OS which is independent of any physical machine – boot “anywhere” – load your specific settings from Google.
I believe it would be a good move for Google. And they could offer somethings not found everywhere at the lowest costs.
For example:
1 – They could offer free hosting to Adsense Publishers, or advertising based free hosting (like Geocities).
2 – They “distributed” nature could provide “distribute” hosting so a hosted site will not have hardware (hard disk, motherboard, connection) failures, this could minimeze need of site backups, because data could not be lost.
3 – They do not need to buy any hosting company, they already have more hardisk space and bandwith than all of the hosting cumpanies.
4 – With the increase importance of Google Apis (search, maps, overture, etc.) sites will have faster responses to Api calls if they are already “inside” Google.
I could cite more samples, but best of all, if Google start such a service, I will be one of their first clients.
If Google does proceed and they will more than likely proceed with the hosting services the smaller hosting companies will see a change in their client base. Most of the “sub-five” dollar hosting clients will shift to Google because of the Google name brand. And since most consumers are sheeps and they trust the big brand name they will move to Google.
If they can afford to give people 2GB+ email accounts for free then why not free web space for those that can’t afford to pay for a decent site?
Why would it be paid hosting?
They’ll make it “free” as long as you include Ad-words advertising!
Anything to attract more content and HTTP links.
>If they can afford to give people 2GB+ email
>accounts for free then why not free web space
>for those that can’t afford to pay for a
>decent site?
Each website uses more bandwith, not only hardisk space. It´s exponentialy dangerous.
I’m waiting for Google’s web hosting service. does anyone tell me where i can find it ??
>I’m waiting for Google’s web hosting service. does anyone tell me where i >can find it ??
Nowhere. =P It doesn’t exist (yet).
And I have a comment relating to Google’s future in hosting. I think if they did like with Gmail, started small (maybe 500MB of space and 10GB of bandwidth per month) then grew, offering more and more until they reached their limits, I think they could pull it off. Put Adsense advertisements on the page, offer a minimum amount of space and bandwidth, then let the numbers grow. Maybe they could make it by invitation only, like they are with Gmail. I can see your sides on the arguments, and while it doesn’t seem possible, if anyone can build world-class hosting, it’s Google. It’s one of the few areas they lack in. Their mission is to provide all the information of the world to people in one place. Having web hosting would help them accomplish just that.
Cheers!
Kirk
I am google lover, seriously looking forward to googles hosting, i have been searching for google hosting, which i expect would come very soon, even before end of may, we will google hosting. Google hosting is important because of the Superior technology, realiable company, and more over a brand. They will offer two service one is 500MB free storage with ad-sense, and unlimited paid storage (very low charge) ofcourse again with ad-sense. with unlimited speed. they would test this similar to Gmail for your domain and then they might go in for full scale.
I am a google lover, seriously looking forward to googles hosting, i have been searching for google hosting almost every day. I am sure, the would start the hosting service very soon, even before end of may 2006. Google hosting is important because of the Superior technology, realiable company, and more over a brand. They will offer two service one is 500MB free storage with ad-sense, and unlimited paid storage (very low charge) ofcourse again with ad-sense. with unlimited speed. they would test this similar to Gmail for your domain and then they might go in for full scale.
Google is hosting… see https://www.google.com/a/ . Some restrictions but free and with some interesting “apps” and “gadgets” to embed.
I am a web developer and I would use google hosting if they had service today I would have already registered some domains and shift to them why? because, if it is google I know that it will be reliable, fast and easy.
Google will try to do something NEW with hosting. Like apples .Mac – a strange combo of online personal storage / easy to publish web content and actual hosting. There’s a iGoogle life … kind of dream … emerging and i would see being either a centrepiece or at least a component of that. The more time people spend with google, the more adds they can sell. I like (iLike) google.
nicholas
Google Hosting will be. I know it.
But at this moment we can only wait on Google.
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